Bathgate Thistle shook off the knocks of a heavy loss to Bo’ness Athletic to pick up a 2-1 home victory against an in-form West Calder United at Creamery Park, writes Kieran Polland.
A late first-half goal from Ally McInnes opened the scoring for the hosts and Aidan Gibb appeared to have wrapped up all three points for Thistle in the second-half, before late drama occurred after James Miller dispatched a penalty for West Calder in stoppage time.
Thistle were able to hold on to their lead and bounce back in style from last week’s disappointing 12-0 reverse to free-scoring East of Scotland Division Three leaders Bo’ness Athletic.
Many expected a free-flowing contest full of goals but the game got off to a cagey start with neither side willing to let the other catch them out.
Bathgate captain Gregor Dryden was the first to give it a go as his header was saved by Dean Shaw in the Calder goal.
The Cauther’s Hassan Nyang came out from the back and displayed some silky skills while Liam Baillie saw his volley well-saved by Thistle’s Macaulay Jarrett.
Just as it looked as both teams were heading into half-time goalless, the breakthrough came when McInnes latched onto a wonderful through ball and dinked the ball into the net despite Shaw managing to get a hand on it.
Bathgate looked to get the second goal and kill the game off in the second-half, and they almost got it early on after Gibb and Kyle Mowatt faced down Shaw in a two-on-one situation.
Gibb squared it to Mowatt, only for the no.11 to somehow balloon his shot into the rainy sky.
West Calder weren’t able to be grateful for that reprieve for long, though, as Gibb was played into the box and rifled a shot past Shaw to extend Thistle’s lead.
The visitors were not for lying down however and tricky winger Miller came off the bench to add some attacking impetus. He jinked into the penalty area only for his shot to be smothered by Jarrett.
McInnes could have sealed the victory for Bathgate when he managed to round the West Calder goalkeeper, but he took too long to sort out his feet and by the time he was able to fire off a shot the covering defence was able to block the attempt.
Just as the clock ticked over 90 minutes, Jarrett brought down Jason Gregory and the referee showed no hesitation to point to the penalty spot. Miller fired the ball into the top right corner to give West Calder hope of snatching a late point, but Thistle were able to dig in for a well- deserved victory.
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